Former prime minister
Kevin Rudd
has called for a major diplomatic restructuring in Asia to head off US-China rivalry in a move that may rekindle tensions inside Labor over his interfering in government policy.

Mr Rudd rejected a push by strategic analyst
Hugh White
– supported by
Paul Keating
– for a new concert of top powers in Asia dominated by the US, China and India.

He said Professor White’s proposal for the top powers to cut a deal on coexistence would not work because it excluded too many significant countries and the region instead needed to build a formal security framework around the 10-member Association of South-East Asian Nations.

Mr Rudd said the 18-member East Asian Summit – which is built on ASEAN – should create a secretariat to allow it to become a much more formal organisation to manage security tensions in Asia, drawing on the institutions that have long existed in Europe.

Mr Rudd’s proposal is significant because many south-east Asian officials and commentators believe he tried to freeze out ASEAN when, as prime minister in 2008, he announced a plan for an Asia Pacific Community.

That body would have brought together the leaders of the top regional powers, including Australia, to deal with major issues that were not being addressed by other groups such as the Asia Pacific Economic Co-operation group or ASEAN.

By launching his latest proposal on Friday at Singapore’s annual security gathering – the Singapore Global Dialogue – Mr Rudd is trying to secure ASEAN support for a faster shift by Asian countries towards the formal security architecture used in Europe.

Mr Rudd said his plan was needed because resolving Asian conflicts such as the China-Japan tension over maritime boundaries was a core issue now that Asia was crucial to the global economy.

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He said he was increasingly concerned about the prospect of conflict over territorial boundaries declaring: “I personally have become deeply concerned about the trajectory we are on. Disputes can escalate and get out of control."

Mr Rudd outlined a highly detailed agenda to build a “Pax Pacifica", including seven principles for peace in Asia, a freeze on border claims and a plan for the East Asia Summit and an existing regional defence ministers’ meeting to set up hot lines and procedures for joint military training exercises.

Former Pakistan foreign secretary Riaz Khan later described Mr Rudd’s ideas as a “long-term plan" but several south-east Asian participants said they believed he did not understand how much bad feeling his last proposal had caused.

One said: “He has completely lied about not leaving ASEAN out. I can’t believe it."

Mr Rudd told the gathering his Asia Pacific Community had succeeded under a different name when the US and Russia joined the East Asian Summit last year but the Southeast Asian participants, who did not want to comment on the record, said he had not done enough diplomatic preparatory work in 2008.

In an apparent turnaround, Mr Rudd said on Friday ASEAN must remain at the core of regional diplomatic architecture because it was the most successful regional organisation.

Mr Rudd said the main challenge for the region was to find a way of merging traditional Chinese approaches to these issues reflecting in the Chinese idea of a “harmonious world" with mainstream western concepts of multilateralism.

The Mandarin speaking former diplomat in Beijing and China business consultant said Chinese ideas needed to be “interpreted into non-Chinese conceptual frameworks."

Mr Rudd rejected the idea that the growing economic interdependency in Asia would prevent military conflict pointing out that the world had been more economically integrated before World War 1.

He said the “nationalistic cocktail" emerging in Asia was “extremely potent."

Mr Rudd a the end of his speech that he was speaking as a private Member of Parliament although during the speech he generally defended Labor government policy on Asia.

The speech continues a spate of public appearances over the past month especially in relation to China policy after several months of silence after he lost his leadership challenge to Julia Gillard earlier in the year and comes ahead of the release of the government’s Asian Century white paper.